


The Girl in the Tower

by Zimra



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M, Gen, Pre-Series, Robert's Rebellion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-27
Updated: 2016-03-29
Packaged: 2018-01-26 17:10:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1696007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zimra/pseuds/Zimra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Lyanna finds out what happened to her father and brother, everything falls apart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

She did not see him for several days after they fought, but when he returned he had that hungry look in his eyes, the one that had sent a thrill through her body so many times before. Now her breath came quickly again, but not with excitement. 

“I don’t want you here,” she said, backing away as he approached her. “I don’t want to see you again. You make me sick, you really do!” She was shouting now, but he took hold of her wrists anyway with a grip so firm she could not break it no matter how she twisted.

“Come to bed, love,” he said in his heart-breaking voice, as rich and musical as it had always been, and before she knew it she was pinned beneath him, and he was pulling aside the light fabric of her gown. She tried to push him away, but to no avail - for all his gentle manners, his warrior’s strength was no match for her thin girl’s body, hardened though it was by riding and fighting with her brothers. 

She dreamed of Brandon that night, Brandon screaming her name and trying to reach her despite the rope that tightened around his neck whenever he moved. But she could not run to him or even scream at him to stop, and soon her brother collapsed to the ground, still and lifeless. She woke already sobbing and drew herself close under the covers, wishing she could somehow disappear and wake up back at Winterfell. 

He came again the next day, and when he tried to kiss her she slapped him hard enough to leave a mark. He pushed her onto the bed and held her down again, and this time she did cry, angry tears that left her eyes red and swollen. Her distress seemed to disturb him, and although he did not leave her until he was finished, she did not see him the next day, or the next. 

All news from the outside world stopped, and for the first time Lyanna truly felt like a prisoner. She tried the door to her room and found it was locked, so she opened a window and sat looking out at the lands below, imagining that she could climb out and fly away. 

Her father and Brandon were dead, and by now Ned and Robert had surely joined them. She cried again at the thought of Ned, her sweetest brother, and the pain he must have endured before Aerys finally let him die. She did not want to marry Robert Baratheon, but she felt sick at the thought of him and Ned, inseparable since boyhood, forced to watch each other being tortured and killed in whatever horrible ways the mad king could dream up. 

Now it was only her and Benjen left, for Benjen was at the Wall where even the king could not touch him. Lyanna fantasized about escaping the tower and stealing a horse and riding north until she found him. She and Benjen could cry together for all that they had lost, and then they could protect each other. Women were not permitted to join the Night’s Watch, but she would be the first, and then she would be free forever: free from politics, free from Rhaegar, free from her own name.

But it was an idle dream, a child’s dream, and she no longer felt much like a child.


	2. Chapter 2

The days passed, then weeks, then months. Rhaegar’s visits resumed, but they were erratic; some weeks he came to her nearly every day, some not at all. At length she was allowed to leave her room again, to take meals with him and his knights in the small dining hall and to move about the tower as she pleased, though she could not go outside. 

She spent many hours at her open window, feeling the sun on her arms and face and letting the dry air roll over her until she could no longer bear the heat. Then she would retreat into the cool stone corridors of the lower floors, sometimes running when there was no one else about to see, pretending that if she looked back over her shoulder she would see Benjen chasing after her.

The tower’s few servants spoke little in her presence, but she overheard enough during her long, restless walks to learn the truth: Ned and Robert still lived. Instead of turning themselves in to the king, they had embarked on a campaign to place Robert on the throne. She heard that Ned had married Catelyn Tully in Brandon’s place, and Jon Arryn had wed her sister Lysa, securing the support of Lord Hoster and his bannermen. Lyanna tried to appear shocked and not elated when Rhaegar finally informed her solemnly that her brother and former betrothed were traitors, but as the weeks stretched on with no more news, she fell back into her old gloom. 

Gradually she became aware of the changes in her body, but she said nothing to anyone until the last possible moment, when it became obvious enough for others to notice. Rhaegar threw back his head and laughed with joy, taking her hand and spinning her around in a wilder version of a courtly dance. He kissed her and called her his beloved, and she smiled wanly and let him.

Despite his happiness at the news, she saw him less often after that, and when he did come to her his bright smiles concealed tension. Before long, she learned why: Ned and Robert’s armies had won too many victories, and the king had grown frightened enough to demand that his son enter the war at last. 

Lyanna was permitted to say farewell to Rhaegar in the courtyard, before the tower’s gates. She could scarcely remember the last time she’d been outside. He kissed her mouth hard, then took her hand in his gauntleted one and pressed them both to her growing belly. 

“Our son will be great someday,” he murmured, giving Lyanna a smile that made her shiver despite the heat. “And we will not be parted long, my love.” Then he mounted his horse and led his men through the gates, and the three Kingsguard knights he’d left behind escorted Lyanna back to her prison.

Soon enough she grew too large and tired to dash through the halls, so she sat by the window until the sun set and the cold desert air soothed her aches. She thought idly that no one would want to marry her now, not even Robert with all his grand words and eager praise. If he and Ned managed to stay alive and win the throne, they would come for her, and she could go back to Winterfell and spend the rest of her days riding through the hills and the forests. She would never have to wed, and the child she carried would be a Stark - _hers,_ not Rhaegar’s.


End file.
